Controversial railway opinions (without a firm foundation in logic..)

[Pdf]

They should move the eurostar terminal back to Waterloo

What would be the benefits of this?

 

[Krokodil]

What would be the benefits of this?

Pissing the French off by reminding them of the battle that Napoleon lost?

 

[The Ham]

Making TOCs use all the stock they have would kill what little redundancy the Network has left.

I also said buying now rolling stock - as such I want implying having no redundancy.

Rather I was taking about ensuring that the level of rolling stock at a TOC was high enough that if along a route there was capacity to stop trains of 6 coaches at the stations then 6 coach trains would run (rather than 2 coach trains). That would be repeated along every route.

For example XC would be required to run (say) 9 coach trains rather than 4 or 5 coach trains.

Yes there would be a need for a lot of extra stock early on.

 

[Speed43125]

British revenue inspection and penalty fare usage is not overly harsh and is actually bordering on lenient by Continental standards.

 

[Kingston Dan]

For the next 25 years, central government funding for rail infrastructure enhancements should only be spent outside London and the South East.
This means high speed links connecting communities in the north and midlands fully completed, major infrastructure work eg Castlefield in Manchester progressed, and full electrification of Midland Main Line and Transpennine routes, etc.
If London and SE want extra infrastructure they should raise money locally.

Sadly the thread is titled without logic...

 

[railfan99]

Seat reservations should be abolished, or charged at a level that discourages people from booking them speculatively or for short hops (e.g. £5-£10 a leg) and limited to maybe 1/4 of the train's seating capacity.

Then solution in my Australian state has been to only have free reserved seats in some cars, and only for trains considered 'long distance' (typically making a trip of 250-350 kilomteres). Passengers without a seat reservation know to go to unreserved cars. On one line (Albury, on Victorian state border with NSW) given fares have been reduced, it's almost as difficult as UK because demand increased and there are standees:

Are reservations compulsory on V/Line services?

www.vline.com.au

No shows don't seem a huge problem but there would be some, as on any mode it's always supposedly five per cent.

 

[Falcon1200]

All coaching stock and units should be blue and grey. Locomotives in blue or large logo blue.

Partly agree; Heritage railway stock should be blue and grey with the odd maroon survivor, locos should be blue or green with full yellow ends, and none of those new-fangled TOPS numbers should be carried.

Pissing the French off by reminding them of the battle that Napoleon lost?

When Eurostar was diverted to St Pancras that station should have been renamed London Agincourt.

 

[xotGD]

Season ticket holders pay the lowest fare on a per journey basis and should therefore be obliged to give up their seats if other passengers are standing.

 

[Silenos]

I'll agree to this - but as a compromise all trains (and especially evening ones) should have a loud coach for those of us with long boring journeys who would rather pass the time with a chat!

Call it the Entertainment Coach.

Thrill as Steve tries to persuade his girlfriend that he isn’t two-timing her with Kylie! Chuckle as Vicky and Kim rehash every detail of Shanelle’s hen night! Learn about widget sales as Mike negotiates the sale of 3 cases of model 51B/390!! Brush up your Spanish as Juan and Maria wonder if this is really the train to their destination!! And move your body to all the latest grime beats as Tony and his crew pump up the volume on their phones!!!

 

[Oxfordblues]

"HS2 is a vanity project, a white elephant and should be scrapped immediately" Really? At this stage it would probably cost more to reinstate the land than to finish it.

 

[eldomtom2]

Depends on how it's phrased and communicated, if the public even hear about it. The word "safety" is always seen as a good thing (see Covid), but the public are also familiar with the concept of "health and safety gone mad" and "excessive red tape."

The usual implication of the phrase "health and safety gone mad" is that "health and safety" is not actually making people more safe.

Has anyone ever taken the train rather than another mode of transport because of high safety standards?

High-profile disasters definitely discourage people from taking the mode of transport involved...

As per the Transport Assessment Guidelines data book

People who talk about roads "not paying their way" are usually a) talking about maintenance and upkeep, not capital investment, b) are talking about the raw amounts of money spent and received, not things like the benefits to the broader economy, and c) would probably disagree with aspects of how the Transport Assessment Guidelines assess benefits and costs.

 

[Silenos]

The usual implication of the phrase "health and safety gone mad" is that "health and safety" is not actually making people more safe.

Or perhaps more often that any increase in safety is minor and outweighed by the inconvenience caused.

 

[Krokodil]

locos should be blue or green with full yellow ends

I agree, especially the steam ones.

People who talk about roads "not paying their way" are usually a) talking about maintenance and upkeep, not capital investment, b) are talking about the raw amounts of money spent and received, not things like the benefits to the broader economy, and c) would probably disagree with aspects of how the Transport Assessment Guidelines assess benefits and costs.

Imagine how much money we could be spending in the UK economy if it wasn't enriching some Arab prince who owns an oil field.

 

[trebor79]

I agree, especially the steam ones.


Imagine how much money we could be spending in the UK economy if it wasn't enriching some Arab prince who owns an oil field.

I have to admit, this was a significant part of my motitfor replacing both of our cars with EVs the instant suitable vehicles came into my price range.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

My "controversial" take (for this website at least) is that I don't care who recorded the automated announcements for the train I'm on.

Perhaps we need a thread for "Aspects of railway enthusiasm that baffle you".

Open Access operations should be banned. They use up track capacity with short units, are primarily abstractive regardless of what they claim, and invariably offer poor service due to the need to cut costs to be viable. The competitor is the car.

Tendering invariably leads to a poor quality product because typically tenders aren't well enough written to avoid suppliers producing cheap junk.

The main controversy there is inaccuracy. There's no OA service less than 5-cars long (other than temporarily shortened 180s), and the franchised operators also run plenty of 5-car inter-city services. There were several single 5-car units on LNER yesterday.

If the Franchised operators aren't serving a market that exists, why shouldn't another operator be given the chance to serve it? A more controversial take would be to make everything open-access.

If revenue is being abstracted, then to steal a phrase from hip-hop "get good, scrub!"

 

[Sonic1234]

High-profile disasters definitely discourage people from taking the mode of transport involved...

True, but if you were to survey passengers on a train about why they decided to travel by rail rather than car, bus etc. I doubt any would say because it is a safer mode of transport.

 

[PacerTrain142]

I know this will be unpopular but as a big pacer fan I say BRING BACK THE PACERS!

They were awesome diesel units (imo), their small size and cheap running costs made them ideal for quieter routes like Ormskirk to Preston or Darlington to Bishop Auckland.

Yes, I know they are not compliant with the new disability legislation, but the thing is, if they are hooked up to a disability compliant unit (for example a class 150) then they can provide extra capacity on busy routes and/or at busy times. No one can complain about riding on a pacer if they have the option of riding on the connected sprinter unit. Northern currently does this with their class 153’s which are not DDA compliant so I don’t see why they couldn’t have kept some of their pacers and done the same.

Also, I don’t see why they couldn’t have refurbised the pacers to meet the disability legislation. People say it’s because of the step on the doors and how it’s not disability friendly, well on every train you still have to step up from the platform to get on the train anyway and the pacers did have a ramp onboard for wheelchairs.

They even refrpurbised a class 144 pacer to meet disability legislation and it looked great, so I don’t see why they couldn’t have done it with the rest of the fleet. Seems daft to have gone to the trouble of refurbishing the unit only to get rid of it a couple of years later.

Also, with the cost of living so high right now, including rail fares, having a train that is cheap to lease and maintain means it’s cheaper to run and would enable cheaper rail fares for passengers.


Another contraversial idea of mine would be to make a new kind of pacer type train, maybe literally just a bus but with train wheels instead of bus wheels. Or just convert some railways into busways/light rail or even a private tarmack road for buses only. It would be much cheaper to operate so would enable cheaper fares and for slower routes probably not much of a difference in journey time, if anything maybe a bit quicker as a bus can accelerate faster than a train can, certainly in terms of initial acceleration between 0 and 20 mph.

 

[JamieL]

True, but if you were to survey passengers on a train about why they decided to travel by rail rather than car, bus etc. I doubt any would say because it is a safer mode of transport.

I think some would. I travel between Bristol and Glasgow where the risk of fatigue and frustration on a 6hr odd drive is ever present - especially with all the roadworks, congestion, stop/start queues, road closures, mechanical breakdown etc. I have never crashed but there have been a few close encounters. Rail in these regards is safer. I only ever drive now if I have too much luggage to use the train.

 

[willgreen]

Yes, I know they are not compliant with the new disability legislation, but the thing is, if they are hooked up to a disability compliant unit (for example a class 150) then they can provide extra capacity on busy routes and/or at busy times.
[...]
Also, with the cost of living so high right now, including rail fares, having a train that is cheap to lease and maintain means it’s cheaper to run and would enable cheaper rail fares for passengers.

If Pacers are only ever going to be added to a pre-existing service - i.e. providing 'extra capacity' - how is this compatible with the suggestion that Pacers would save money?

 

[PacerTrain142]

If Pacers are only ever going to be added to a pre-existing service - i.e. providing 'extra capacity' - how is this compatible with the suggestion that Pacers would save money?

Becuase instead of using say a 150 + 156 they could use a 150 + 142 instead.

 

[Krokodil]

and the franchised operators also run plenty of 5-car inter-city services

That doesn't make it a good thing. Ask anyone unfortunate enough to use XC, or have a browse through the GWR short-form thread.

 

[Bletchleyite]

That doesn't make it a good thing. Ask anyone unfortunate enough to use XC, or have a browse through the GWR short-form thread.

Yes, my take is that nobody should be running 5 car sets on any London InterCity service, nor on XC, except at the very quiet extremes of the day, as this is a waste of capacity. Full length trains should be used, portion worked if one destination alone can't be justified.

As for competition, the car is the competitor and it's high time the railway realised that.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

That doesn't make it a good thing. Ask anyone unfortunate enough to use XC, or have a browse through the GWR short-form thread.

I didn't say it was. Bletchleyite said that Open Access operators are wasteful because they use up valuable paths with short trains- but when the competing franchised operator also uses trains of the same length on their own paths it's unjust to single out the OA companies.

Again, if there's a market that is catered to by an open access service it's because the franchised operator has failed to cater for it.

 

[willgreen]

Becuase instead of using say a 150 + 156 they could use a 150 + 142 instead.

That’s not extra capacity though, it’s swapping a unit for another, older unit

 

[[.n]]

What would be the benefits of this?

Easier connection for me for eurostar

Thread did state without logic!

 

[Krokodil]

As for competition, the car is the competitor and it's high time the railway DfT realised that.

Corrected for you.

 

[xotGD]

Perhaps we need a thread for "Aspects of railway enthusiasm that baffle you".

Yes please!

A few from me:

Seat manufacturers
The length of coaches
Every tiny detail of electrification projects
Being so fixated on mileage (and mistaking precision for accuracy)
Vexation about the removal of services at stupid o'clock in the morning that nobody actually travel on
Being bothered about which set of Mark 4s or Mark 5s is on a particular service especially when not concerned about the locomotive

 

[PGAT]

Surely everyone has their “thing” where they care about those details!

 

[gc4946]

Yes please!

A few from me:

Seat manufacturers
The length of coaches
Every tiny detail of electrification projects
Being so fixated on mileage (and mistaking precision for accuracy)
Vexation about the removal of services at stupid o'clock in the morning that nobody actually travel on
Being bothered about which set of Mark 4s or Mark 5s is on a particular service especially when not concerned about the locomotive

When new equipment (DMU etc) first entered service and its foibles
Who makes automated on-train announcements (I'm not fussy as long as they're clear and to the point)

 

[The Puddock]

My "controversial" take (for this website at least) is that I don't care who recorded the automated announcements for the train I'm on.

Perhaps we need a thread for "Aspects of railway enthusiasm that baffle you".

Who makes automated on-train announcements (I'm not fussy as long as they're clear and to the point)

I didn’t realise that people had any interest in knowing the names behind the voices until I first saw it here. I must confess I find it a bit creepy and stalkerish.